Miami Holds Off Florida St.

Xavier Beitia now knows torture beyond what any Florida State kicker has experienced, as unbelievable as that may seem.

There is a long list of Seminole kickers who have nightmares about footballs going wide left or wide right and Miami players dancing victoriously off the field. Matt Munyon, Dan Mowrey and Gerry Thomas all missed field goals that would have either won or tied games against Miami in the final seconds.

Yet Beitia is the only one who will get that as a double feature.

Beitia saw a chance to redeem himself sail wide right on what might have been a 39-yard field goal Monday. That left Miami with an ugly 16-14 Orange Bowl victory in front of 76,739 at Pro Player Stadium, their second victory over rival Florida State this season.

True, this time there were 5 minutes 30 seconds left, not the one second that was left when he missed in a 28-27 loss in 2000. That hardly dulled the pain on the Florida State side.

“This is another one of those games we could have won it, what was it wide right?” Florida State Coach Bobby Bowden said. “We never know which way it’s going to go, wide left, wide right. I told the kids that Miami made one more play than we did. That was the difference. That could have been an interception or a fumble.”

Jarrett Payton, the game’s most valuable player, gained 131 yards and set up two Miami touchdowns with long runs. But, as has often been the case, kickers decided a Florida State-Miami game.

Miami kicker Jon Peattie made three of four, including a career-long 51-yarder that gave the Hurricanes a 16-14 lead with 10:19 left in the third quarter. Beitia gaffed his only try.

It’s enough to make a coach feel cursed.

“I might as well feel that way,” Bowden said. “I said before that I have never seen a rivalry decided by so many missed kicks. And that was two kicks ago. It happened again two years ago and again tonight. I’m having a hard time understanding it.”

After Beitia missed, Florida State stopped the Hurricanes on three downs. But on fourth and one, Miami’s D.J. Williams took a short snap and went 31 yards up the middle.

“Sometimes you just have a feeling that something is going to work,” Miami Coach Larry Coker said.

“D.J. is a big and physical guy. I felt if he got a crease, he’d get the first down.”

The Miami drive ended in a blocked 45-yard field-goal attempt by Peattie. That gave Florida State one last chance, 72 yards from the end zone and 2:18 left on the clock.

The drive ended when P.K. Sam couldn’t control a Chris Rix pass on a fourth-and-12 play at midfield.

“That was two great defenses,” Bowden said.

“It came down to who made the fewest mistakes.”

Just who that would be was hard to say until the end.

The offenses were best reflected by their quarterbacks.

Miami’s Brock Berlin had two pass intercepted, one in the end zone. He also fumbled on a third down play, which set up Beitia’s field-goal try.

Rix had another woeful night against the Hurricanes. He was intercepted once, bringing his career total in four games against Miami to seven, and finished six for 19 for 96 yards.

He did make two good throws, which was pretty much the extent of the Seminole offense. Rix connected with Chauncey Stovall on a 52-yard pass that set up Lorenzo Booker’s nine-yard touchdown run. On Florida State’s next possession, Rix rolled left and found Matt Henshaw in the end zone for a 14-3 lead with 8:41 left in the second quarter.

“Miami is always capable of playing good defense,” Bowden said. “In the games they lost, their offense threw interceptions.”

So the offense restricted its throwing and gave the ball to Payton more often.

Payton’s 46-yard run set up a three-yard touchdown run by Tyler Moss with 5:34 left in the half. His 37-yard run led to the first of three Peattie field goals, something the Seminoles couldn’t match..

“If we would have kicked the ball through the goal post, we’d been all right,” Bowden said.